Against Alcibiades (9-26)

Hence I cannot but think it strange that while defendants who are convicted by but a single vote[*] are put to death and have their property confiscated by you, those who win their case should have to face the same charges again: that while the court has the power to take away life, it should so clearly lack the authority to save it once and finally, especially as the laws forbid the same charge to be brought twice against the same defendant, and you have sworn to observe those laws.

I shall therefore say nothing of myself. I wish instead to remind you of the past of Alcibiades— although such is the multitude of his misdeeds that I am at a loss where to begin: there is not one of them that does not press for mention. Were I faced with the task of describing at length his career as an adulterer, as a stealer of the wives of others, as a perpetrator of acts of lawless violence in general, the time at my disposal would be all too short, and I should furthermore earn the ill-will of many of my fellows for making public the injuries which they have suffered. Of his conduct towards the state, however, and towards the members of his family and such citizens and foreigners as have crossed his path, I will give you some account.

To begin with, he persuaded you to revise the assessment of the tribute of the subject-states made with the utmost fairness by Aristeides.[*] Chosen with nine others to perform the task,[*] he practically doubled the contribution of each member of the alliance, while by showing how formidable he was and how influential, he made the revenues of the state a means of procuring revenue for himself.[*] Now just consider: when our safety depends entirely upon our allies and those allies are acknowledged to be worse off today than in the past, how could anyone do greater mischief than by doubling the tribute of each?

In fact, if you hold that Aristeides was a good Athenian and a just one, you can only regard Alcibiades as a scoundrel, since his policy towards the subject-states is the exact opposite of that of Aristeides. Indeed, because of his behaviour, many are leaving their homes as exiles and going off to settle at Thurii[*]; while the bitter feeling of the allies will manifest itself directly there is a war at sea between Sparta and ourselves. In my own opinion, he is a worthless statesman who considers only the present without also giving thought to the future, who advocates the policy which will best please the people and says nothing of that which their true interests require.

I am astonished, furthermore, at those who are persuaded that Alcibiades is a lover of democracy, that form of government which more than any other would seem to make equality its end. They are not using his private life as evidence of his character, in spite of the fact that his greed and his arrogance are plain to them. On his marriage with the sister of Callias he received a dowry of ten talents; yet after Hipponicus[*] had lost his life as one of the generals at Delium,[*] he exacted another ten, on the ground that Hipponicus had agreed to add this further sum as soon as Alcibiades should have a child by his daughter.

Then, after obtaining a dowry such as no Greek had ever obtained before, he behaved in so profligate a fashion, bringing mistresses, slave and free, into the bridal house, that he drove his wife, who was a decent woman, to present herself before the Archon, as she was legally entitled to do, and divorce him. At that he gave conspicuous proof of his power. He called in his friends, and carried off his wife from the Agora by force, showing the whole world his contempt for the magistrates, the laws, and his fellow Athenians in general. Nor was this one outrage enough for him. He went further.

In order to possess himself of Hipponicus’ estate, he planned the assassination of Callias. Callias himself accused him of it before you all in the Assembly, and, for fear that his wealth would cost him his life, made over his property to the state in the event of his dying without issue. However, Callias neither lacks friends nor is he an easy victim. Thanks to his riches he can be sure of protection in plenty. None the less, when a man offers violence to his own wife and plots the death of his brother-in-law, how is he to be expected to behave towards such of his fellow-citizens as cross his path? Everyone has more regard for members of his own family than he has for strangers.

But most monstrous of all is the fact that a man of his character should talk as though he were a friend of the people, and call others oligarchs and foes of the democracy. Yes, although he himself deserves death for behaving as he does, he is chosen by you to proceed against any whose sympathies conflict with yours ; and he poses as guardian of the constitution, in spite of the fact that he refuses to be the equal of, or but little superior to, his fellows. So completely, indeed, does he despise you that he spends his time flattering you in a body and insulting you individually.

Why, there are no limits to his impudence. He persuaded Agatharchus, the artist, to accompany him home,[*] and then forced him to paint; and when Agatharchus appealed to him, stating with perfect truth that he could not oblige him at the moment because he had other engagements, Alcibiades threatened him with imprisonment, unless he started painting straight away. And he carried out his threat. Agatharchus only made his escape three months later, by slipping past his guards and running away as he might have done from the king of Persia. But so shameless is Alcibiades that he went to Agatharchus and accused him of doing him a wrong; instead of apologizing for his violence, he uttered threats against him for leaving his work unfinished. Democracy, freedom went for nothing: Agatharchus had been put in chains exactly like any acknowledged slave.

It makes me angry to think that while you yourselves cannot place even malefactors under arrest without risk, because it is enacted that anyone who fails to gain one-fifth of the votes shall be liable to a fine of a thousand drachmae, Alcibiades, who imprisoned a man for so long and forced him to paint, went unpunished—nay, increased thereby the awe and the fear in which he is held. In our treaties with other states[*] we make it a condition that no free man shall be imprisoned or placed in durance, and a heavy fine is prescribed as the penalty for so doing. Yet when Alcibiades behaved as he did, no one sought satisfaction, whether for himself or for the state.

Obedience to the magistrates and the laws is to my mind the one safeguard of society; and anyone who sets them at nought is destroying at one blow the surest guarantee of security which the state possesses. It is hard enough to be made to suffer by those who have no conception of right and wrong; but it is far more serious when a man who knows what the public interest requires, acts in defiance of it. He shows clearly, as Alcibiades has done, that instead of holding that he ought himself to conform with the laws of the state, he expects you to conform with his own way of life.

Then again, remember Taureas[*] who competed against Alcibiades as Choregus of a chorus of boys.[*] The law allows the ejection of any member whatsoever of a competing chorus who is not of Athenian birth, and it is forbidden to resist any attempt at such ejection. Yet in your presence, in the presence of the other Greeks who were looking on, and before all the magistrates in Athens, Alcibiades drove off Taureas with his fists.[*] The spectators showed their sympathy with Taureas and their hatred of Alcibiades by applauding the one chorus and refusing to listen to the other at all. Yet Taureas was none the better off for that.

Partly from fear, partly from subservience, the judges pronounced Alcibiades the victor, treating him as more important than their oath. And it seems to me only natural that the judges should thus seek favour with Alcibiades, when they could see that Taureas, who had spent so vast a sum, was being subjected to insults, while his rival, who showed such contempt for the law, was all-powerful. The blame lies with you. You refuse to punish insolence; and while you chastise secret wrongdoing, you admire open effrontery.

That is why the young spend their days in the courts instead of in the gymnasia; that is why our old men fight our battles, while our young men make speeches— they take Alcibiades as their model, Alcibiades who carries his villainy to such unheard-of lengths that, after recommending that the people of Melos[*] be sold into slavery, he purchased a woman from among the prisoners and has since had a son by her, a child whose birth was more unnatural than that of Aegis—thus,[*] since he is sprung from parents who are each other’s deadliest enemies, and of his nearest kin the one has committed and the other has suffered the most terrible of wrongs.

Indeed it would be well to make such shamelessness still plainer. He got himself a child by the very woman whom he had turned from a free citizen into a slave, whose father and kinsfolk he had put to death and whose city he had made a waste, that he might thereby make his son the deadly enemy of himself and of this city; so inevitably is the boy driven to hate both. When you are shown things of this kind on the tragic stage, you regard them with horror; but when you see them taking place in Athens, you remain unmoved—and yet you are uncertain whether the tales of tragedy are founded on the truth or spring merely from the imagination of the poets; whereas you well know that these other lawless outrages, which you accept with indifference, have occurred in fact.

In addition to all this, some dare to say that the like of Alcibiades has never been before. For my part, I believe that Athens will meet with terrible calamities at his hands, that he will be deemed responsible hereafter for disasters so awful that no one will remember his past misdeeds; for it is only to be expected that one who has begun his life in such a fashion will make its close no less portentous. Men of sense should beware of those of their fellows who grow too great, remembering that it is such as they who set up tyrannies.

I imagine that Alcibiades will make no reply to this, but will talk instead of his victory at Olympia,[*] and that he will seek to defend himself on any grounds rather than those on which he has been charged. But I will use the very facts upon which he relies to prove that he deserves death rather than acquittal. Let me explain.

Diomedes took a chariot-team to Olympia. He was a man of moderate means, but desired to win a garland for Athens and for his family with such resources as he had, since he held that the chariot-races were for the most part decided by chance. Diomedes was no casual competitor, but a citizen of Athens.[*] Yet thanks to his influence with the Masters of the Games[*] at Elis, Alcibiades deprived him of his team and competed with it himself. What would he have done, may we ask, had one of your allies arrived with a team?